Inception Explained

After the first extraction fails, Cobb spins his top to check if he is in a dream. It falls over. Saito says he'll clear Cobb's name if he takes the job. He asks Cobb to take Cobb needs a Cobb starts Cobb goes to Mombasa to get Eames the forger The team enters dream level Cobb wakes The team enters After Fischer Cobb confronts Cobb washes Cobb spins the Arriving home, Cobb finally sees top-it's still his children's Mal in limbo, is killed in level three, Cobb and up on the beach (full circle with beginning). up on a beach. new architect. assembling his dream level His father-in-law, team and trains spinning when one-the city. Cobb recounts two, the hotel, and Fischer is incepted in the hospital. Miles, introduces Ariadne in and Yusuf the and then dream Ariadne chase faces. the movie cuts him to Ariadne. dreamweaving. chemist to Ariadne his level three, the him into limbo. to black. WHAT HAPPENS "a leap of faith." history with Mal. hospital/fortress. HI Filmmaker Nolan THE ENDING IS NOT A DREAM. Saito spins the top-and it keeps spinning. Dream. Saito spins the top, and it spins This establishes After a test The top totters: is asking the context for the forever-we can audience-the dream ends It's about to fall. audience to take a leap of faith that the movie is badly, Cobb spins his top. It falls. Still not a dream. "For the ambiguity separate dreams movie is not all from reality. "The important thing is that Cobb's not looking at at the end to work, a dream. you need to see that "The kids are not a dream. the top. He doesn't care." Cobb's world and not wearing the dream world are the same "This gives Cobba base- line reality. Mal asks Cobb to "take a leap of faith" before her very similar. And you need to doubt Cobb." clothes at the Thẻ top doesn't THE ENTIRE MOVIE IS A DREAM. Miles tells Cobb Mal challenges Cobb's reality Faceless corpo- rations? Chased As in The Tem- The phrase leap of faith We never see The kids haven't pest, Cobb wakes up in a end!And they do age!We were working how Cobb gets agedl And they're in the same clothes! to "come back to matter-Cobb to Mombasa, can finally see his children's faces. But he's an occurs over and over. It's an arti- fact of Cobb's subconscious. reality"-a sign that he's living in a dream. new world. untrustworthy narrator." where men in suicide. The line's with two sets suits try to kill him. It's a dream. reverberating in his subconscious. around the This is clearly all a dream. of kids." globe? Really? JUST THE ENDING IS A DREAM. OK, Cobb's not dreaming. But "I don't think l'm going to tell you about this." Saito honors his agreement. They Yusuf's assis- Cobb and Saito The top is going to spin forever. The ending is a dream. "Uh.. that's not tant says that to a dreamer, the dream is real- ity. Reality is subjective. created this that doesn't how I would have build limbo to world for this mean he won't unknowingly enter a dream. read the movie." be their reality moment. The together. ending is a dream catharsis. THE MOVIE IS A HEROIC EPIC. In Greek mythol- ogy, Ariadne A classic "call to Cobb begins his To see his kids OK, we have no idea how the top finishes the hero's journey. Ariadne leads The hero has "Iwanted to show the poten- tial for the real world to have analogies to the dream world. The mazelike city of Mom- basa does that." again, Cobb vanquishes Mal -and his sub- conscious-by saying good-bye adventure." Cobb descent to the Cobb into the succeeded underworld. It in his quest. He sees his kids faces. Catharsis is reached. initially refuses, then accepts. aided Theseus in defeating the Minotaur. She'll be Cobb's guide. underworld. In heroic epics, this is "crossing starts with "the road of trials. "I've never read Joseph Campbell. Some things were "The prop guys just made a top that would spin for a long time." the threshold." on my mind-the labyrinth, the Minotaur, etc." "The film is about It's the golden-lit The top itself is craftsman dream constructed- topologically, it's a pseudosphere, every point curv- OR MAYBE IT'S A A beautiful pan Cobb tries to across Paris roof- limit Ariadne's creativity in the dreamspace: no specific memo- ries as templates. A beautiful pan across Tokyo rooftops. A beautiful pan across rooftops Cobb spent some 50 years in limbo with The architecture of the hotel is Cobb and Mal's The destruc- tion of limbo is architects. personal archi- tecture includes building one kind lypse of decay- of world inside the ing skyscrapers. skin of another. MEDITATION ON It's about ARCHITECTURE. home. with tops. Also, Miles says he has "no space to think." of Mombasa. Arthur's weapon an urban apoca- builders." (walls, Penrose stairs, elevator). Mal. Their world a house made is an architec- of blocks on the tural mnemonic. dining table. ing away "Ididn't intend to make a film ACTUALLY, IT'S ABOUT MOVIE- MAKING. Movies ask us All the roles cor- respond. Cobb: director. Ariadne: implausible coinci- writer. Eames: art dences-the gram- The audience has to "take a leap of faith." Nolan uses Smash cuts, mys- The meaning of the movie (Cobb's defeat of Mal) has been given to the audience. We've been incepted. about filmmak- to take a leap terious chases, ing, buti gravi- tated toward of faith-to sus- "Oh no, I've got an answer ..." ambiguity as a storytelling tool. There isn't just one answer. pend disbelief. the creative director. Saito: mar of film is the process thatl know." producer. Fischer: grammar of dreams. audience. "I wouldn't say that I tried to use the grammar of the film to tell the audience what is dream and what is reality." NO, WHAT'S REALLY HAPPENING